ANDERSON — The sputtering economy has not spared high school football. Except when T.L. Hanna and Westside meet.

Both schools have experienced downturns in crowds at home games this season, in part because of rainy weather, a lack of fans rooting for the visiting team, and sub-par win/loss records. The low turnout of visiting fans could be blamed on the teams’ schedule with Hanna playing Dorman and Gaffney, both near Spartanburg, and Westside playing Clover, which is in the Rock Hill area.

The schools’ average gate receipts have gross sales of $10,000, but against Gaffney and Dorman high schools, Hanna reported a gate of $4,000 or less. Against Clover High, on homecoming, Westside brought in $8,300.

“I’m sure their fans are like, ‘We can’t do it,” Hanna athletics director and football coach Kenya Fouch said. “You’re talking about schools that traditionally have a great big huge fan following. We just kind of expected it to be one of our bigger years as far as gate. But I guess the economy just made it so it’s impossible for them to make the trips.”

Gas prices were at their recent peak when Hanna played Gaffney and Dorman in back-to-back weeks in late September.

While the schools have said they’ve lost up to $5,000 per game because of small crowds, the August Hanna-Westside game brought in more than $40,000, thanks in part to the $8 ticket price for adults. Two years ago, the schools raised ticket prices $1 to $6, but raised the rivalry game tickets this year to help offset reduced budgets and rising expenses. Student tickets have remained $6.

Westside coach and athletics director Ted Luckadoo said Anderson’s rivalry ticket price change followed others around the state who raised single-game prices. Spartanburg, Dorman, Gaffney and Byrnes all raise their prices for rivalry games, Luckadoo said.

While the August game has been more popular since they began a two-game season series eight years ago, the crowd for tonight’s meeting could fluctuate depending on the weather, the teams’ records, and any playoff implications.

Hanna is 3-7, Westside is 4-6, and both teams need to win to make the playoffs. The loser will not make the postseason.

“I’m sure it’ll be down some,” Luckadoo said of the crowd this week compared with the game in August. “If somebody needs that money to spend on something else, they need to spend it on something else.”

The downturn in crowd sizes doesn’t just impact the football team. Money earned from football games is used to pay for non-revenue sports, particularly those like girls’ tennis and girls’ golf, which don’t charge.

So when the athletics department’s income shrinks, every program suffers. Fouch said football, basketball, and volleyball are the only Hanna programs that make money.

“Maybe the athletics department has funded a basketball tournament in the past, now they’re having to raise their own money,” he said.

If football games are losing $5,000 per game more than they did last year, the four non-rivalry games amount to $20,000, or about a $2,000 cut per sport. For the golf teams, as an example, that means playing with lesser equipment.

So even in a slumping econony, rivalry games can keep athletics programs afloat.

“Games like that are what’s gonna help us get through a year,” Fouch said. “(That first) gate was big enough to help cover at least a couple of bad gates, but not five bad gates.”